VALDOSTA, Ga. – The No. 2-ranked and Gulf South Conference regular season champion Valdosta State men's tennis team opens the 2023 GSC Championship Thursday at 3:30 p.m. ET versus No. 8-seed Shorter at the Lagoon Park and O'Connor Tennis Center in Montgomery, Ala.  
 
Click here for the GSC Championship Central webpage for the tournament and for links to live stats of the matches.  
 
The Blazers went 14-0 and a perfect 9-0 in Gulf South Conference play during the regular season, including knocking off two top-ranked teams in the same season for the first time in program history.  VSU defeated then-No. 1 Barry 4-3 on Mar. 5 and then upset current No. 1 Saint Leo, 4-0 on Mar. 24.  VSU has defeated eight teams ranked in the top 25 of the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA).  Most recently, VSU downed No. 4 West Florida a week ago Monday to win the outright league regular season title.
 
VSU is going for its league-best 15^th Gulf South Conference championship as the Blazers and West Florida each have won 14 titles for the most in league history.  Since 1994, either VSU, UWF or both have reached the conference title match consecutively.  Moreover, VSU had UWF have met for the league title each of the last seven tournaments with VSU leading 4-3 during that span.  VSU is 69-18 all-time since 1991 in the GSC Championship with 26 tournament championship match appearances (14-12). 
 
This marks the first time VSU has played Shorter in the GSC postseason since 2015 when the Blazers won 5-1 in the quarterfinal round.  This is Shorter's third appearance in the tournament all-time (0-2).
 
The Hawks finished the regular season 2-9 overall and 1-8 in GSC play earning the No. 8-seed by virtue of a tiebreaker with Christian Brothers and Delta State.  VSU defeated Shorter in Rome, Ga., this season, 7-0 on Mar. 28.  In that match, VSU clinched the doubles point with three victories as SU duo of Strahinja Radanovic and Jan Kos, gave Blazer duo of juniors Rodrigo Carvalho and Luca Mack a match as the Blazers won 7-5. 
 
In singles, VSU won five of the six matches in straight-sets as Radanovic gave Mack, who was then and currently is ranked No. 2 nationally to three sets with Mack prevailing 5-7, 6-4, 6-4.  Kos also gave junior Christian Wedel a scare in the first set as Wedel won 7-6 (8-6) and then won 6-1 in the second set at No. 2.  The Blazers lead the all-time series with Shorter, 12-0.
 
If the Blazers were to defeat Shorter, they would then face the winner of the No. 4/5 matchup between West Alabama and Lee on Friday at 3:30 p.m. ET at Lagoon Park.  VSU won 4-3 over West Alabama in Pensacla, Fla., losing the doubles point and winning four of the six singles matches in straight-sets.  Junior Pedro Cordeiro clinched the match at No. 6, 6-0, 6-2, over Ilia Dehoudiuk for a 4-2 score before UWA won the last match for the 4-3 final.  The Blazers defeated Lee on the road, 5-2, in a very tough match with Wedel clinching it at No. 4 in a 6-4, 7-6 (7-4) victory over Wihan Van Der Merwe.  
 
On the other side of the bracket, No. 3 Auburn Montgomery plays No. 6 Mississippi College and no. 2 West Florida battles No. 7 Montevallo.   The Championship match is set for Saturday, Apr. 22 at 12 p.m. ET at Lagoon Park.
 
The Blazers enter the week tops in the latest NCAA South Region rankings, while Saint Leo is second in the rankings, followed by Barry, West Florida and Rollins rounds out the top five.  Lynn sits sixth, followed by Auburn Montgomery, West Alabama, Lee and Embry-Riddle is tenth.  There will be one more public region ranking, scheduled for Apr. 19, followed by the NCAA Division II Men's Tennis Selection Show, Apr. 24 at 8 p.m., streamed live on NCAA.com.  
 
If the NCAA Tournament began today, VSU most likely would be one of two teams to host a four-team regional with seeds 4/5/8 coming to Titletown, while seeds 3/6/7 would head to Saint Leo.  The dates of the NCAA South Regional would be Apr. 28-29.  The two winners of each of the regional sites then would advance to the NCAA Division II Men's Tennis National Championship, scheduled for the USTA National Campus in Orlando, Fla., May 11-16.  
 
This season, the Blazers are led by Mack and Carvalho at doubles as the tandem is No. 8 nationally with a 13-1 record this spring.  The duo went a perfect 9-0 in GSC play and have won 11-straight matches overall.  Sophomore Lamar Bartley and senior Christian Felline are 7-2 at the No. 2 spot in doubles and 5-1 in league play, while Cordeiro/Wedel are 9-2 overall in doubles and 8-2 in GSC play with a 4-2 mark in the GSC.  
 
Mack is No. 2 nationally in singles and is 21-1 overall, while he is 12-0 in the spring and 9-0 in league play this spring.  Mack finished as national runner-up at the ITA Fall National Championship this past October.  Carvalho is 47^th with a 10-2 record this spring and went 6-2 in GSC play mainly at the No. 2 spot in the lineup, while Wedel is 52^nd with a 15-2 record and a 13-1 mark this spring as he also went 9-0 in league play.  Cordeiro went 12-2 this spring and 9-0 in league play mainly at No. 6 singles and Felline was 8-2 this spring and 6-2 in conference play, while Bartley is 7-2 and 4-1 in conference play in dual matches.  
 
This year marks the first time since 2006 the Blazers went undefeated during the regular season as that year VSU won 20-straight matches en route to a 26-1 record capping off the season with a dominating 5-2 victory over Lynn to win the Blazer tennis program's first national title and third title in school history.  VSU's only loss of the season came in the conference tournament championship match against West Florida.